Channel Four In Numbers II: Ratingsgeddon

Yes, we know we said ‘more tomorrow’, but we’ve been busy laughing in the face of EU Working Hours legislation. Bwa-ha-ha-hangonwe’rebeingexploited.

Anyway, numbers. Our mammoth listing of eleven years of weekly Channel Four viewing charts takes in 11,736 individual broadcasts, which is possibly about the same as the average lifespan of a shirehorse. A few days ago, we looked at the highest rated programmes, but what of those hearty mainstays? The shows that flutter around the top thirties week in, week out, maybe not quite getting mammoth audiences, but always somehow in your peripheral vision, like a moth waving a flag? What of them, eh? The list contains a grand total of 1,964 different shows, and here are the hundred appearing most frequently in each weekly BARB rundown. Just under a shot of Michael Grade looking a bit dishevelled in 1990.

“The annual report shoot is today? Frigging heck, I thought it had been postponed until Wednesday.”

Rank

Programme

Appearances on list

Av. Weekly Pos.

1

Hollyoaks

1824

18.74

2

The Simpsons

1257

17.74

3

Countdown

1213

13.24

4

Deal Or No Deal

1040

11.53

5

Big Brother

836

5.74

6

Brookside

575

5.05

7

Richard And Judy

527

23.52

8

Friends

485

14.34

9

Fifteen-To-One

445

23.44

10

Pet Rescue

442

22.36

11

Paul O'Grady

439

15.85

12

A Place In The Sun

249

18.25

13

V Graham Norton

241

15.92

14

Come Dine With Me

240

16.90

15

Frasier

187

15.68

16

Ricki Lake

183

22.07

17

E.R.

163

14.06

18

Time Team

162

15.05

19

Celebrity Big Brother

120

6.87

20

Will And Grace

115

14.43

21

Desperate Housewives

111

11.67

22

Property Ladder

110

7.67

23

Grand Designs

101

4.26

24

Location, Location, Location

95

7.71

25

Sex And The City

90

13.62

26

Scrapheap Challenge

89

14.37

27

Wife Swap

82

11.91

28

Ally McBeal

79

16.41

29

Relocation, Relocation

76

3.62

30

Eurotrash

73

16.68

31

So Graham Norton

69

13.01

32

10 Years Younger

67

12.19

33

Father Ted

66

18.65

34

Cricket Afternoon

66

19.45

35

Big Brother's Little Brother

66

23.42

36

Shameless

65

9.98

37

T.F.I Friday

63

20.13

38

Without A Trace

56

18.79

39

South Park

55

17.62

40

Cutting Edge

54

15.63

41

Lost

52

8.10

42

No Going Back

49

8.33

43

Ugly Betty

49

14.65

44

How Clean Is Your House?

48

11.71

45

Stargate Sg-1

46

20.17

46

8 Out Of 10 Cats

44

10.89

47

You Are What You Eat

42

8.86

48

Selling Houses

42

9.26

49

Montel Williams Show

41

24.56

50

Supernanny

38

5.55

51

Gordon Ramsay's F Word

38

7.08

52

Dispatches

37

19.27

53

Teachers

36

13.56

54

The Salon

34

24.03

55

How Clean Is Your House

33

7.76

56

Secret History

31

17.74

57

Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares

29

3.72

58

The Secret Millionaire

29

4.90

59

Location/Location

29

13.17

60

It's Me Or The Dog

29

13.69

61

The City Gardener

29

14.34

62

Jamie At Home

29

16.07

63

Home From Home

29

25.38

64

How To Look Good Naked

28

8.79

65

Top Tens

28

20.43

66

My Name Is Earl

27

23.26

67

Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares USA

26

4.85

68

The Osbournes

26

12.42

69

Scrubs

26

19.92

70

Channel 4 News

26

22.50

71

Trigger Happy Tv

24

10.58

72

Smack The Pony

23

17.26

73

Driven

23

24.30

74

The Games

22

13.00

75

Secrets Of The Dead

22

13.91

76

Faking It

22

16.82

77

No Angels

22

20.59

78

Enterprise

22

22.00

79

Nypd Blue

22

23.45

80

Bremner, Bird And Fortune

21

23.24

81

Pet Rescuers

21

24.00

82

Room For Improvement

21

24.19

83

Salvage Squad

20

20.55

84

Supersize Vs Superskinny

19

11.63

85

Battle Stations

19

17.37

86

A Place In Greece

19

19.05

87

Heroes Of Comedy

19

20.21

88

Location, Location, Location Revisited

18

6.39

89

Other People's Houses

18

14.22

90

Peter Kay's Phoenix Nights

18

14.39

91

Max & Paddy's Road To Nowhere

17

16.29

92

Spin City

17

20.35

93

The Friday Night Project

17

21.06

94

Real Gardens

17

21.71

95

Equinox

17

21.88

96

Grand Designs Revisited

16

5.63

97

A Place In France

16

8.13

98

Gok's Fashion Fix

16

11.06

99

Football Stories

16

21.44

100

Stargate S G-1

16

22.19

And so, despite taking an average weekly position between 18th and 19th in the charts, and featuring lots of characters from Chester (we’re from Wrexham, it’s a local thing), Hollyoaks is the most ever-present show in the BARB hit parade over the last eleven years. That’s a full 567 broadcasts ahead of The Simpsons in second, despite it being, as far as we’ve been able to tell when seeing any of it, well, a bit shite actually.

Other notables: Countdown pipping Deal Or No Deal into third on the list, but given DOND has only been on air for less than half of the period under consideration, well done Noel. Big Brother and Brookside are the only shows in the top twenty to regularly warrant a place in weekly top tens. Meanwhile, Richard And Judy, Fifteen-To-One, Pet Rescue and Ricky Lake make the list of twentymost perma-hits, despite averaging placings in the lower third of each weekly rundown.

Slightly unsuprisingly, Friends is the most popular non-Simpson comedy, clocking up 485 appearance, most of which are repeats, while Frasier only performs slightly less admirably. In the arena of homegrown sitcommery, Father Ted reigns supreme, notching up 66 appearances in the list. That’s especially impressive given that the figures listed on BARB’s website don’t even start until five weeks after the premiere of the last ever Fr Ted episode, meaning that each appearance in the list is from a repeat showing. Indeed, there were only 25 episodes of Ted ever made, compared to 236 episodes of Friends (many of which were first-run). That means the average Ted episode appears 2.64 times on the list, whereas the average Friends ep makes it there just 2.06 times. This means that Craggy Island is officially better than New York. Sort of. In other US sitcom news, the magnificent My Name Is Earl sits in 66th place, narrowly beating the got-annoying-after-four-series Scrubs, yet the only reward both shows received was a sideways shunt onto E4. Bah.

As for US drama shows, E.R. is king, with Fall And Rise Of Reginald Perrin But With A Skinny American Woman… sorry, Ally McBeal following closely. Without A Trace performs admirably in 42nd place (just in front of the surely-everyone-hated-it-by-then TFI Friday), but Lost performed very well, putting in 52 appearances from the 49 episodes C4 had the rights to, most of which were premiered on E4. After all, Lost isn’t really a show that lends itself to repeat showings.

As for lifestyle shows, there are sterling performances from Pet Rescue, A Place In The Sun, Come Dine With Me, Time Team, Property Ladder, Grand Designs and Location x3. No idea why most of their advertising is from personal injury lawyers and 21st-century-rag-and-bone-men if they’re that popular.

Anyway, enough of annoyingly successful programmes. Here are a few selections from lower down the list that are sure to infuriate you, if you’ve got any sense. So much so, in fact, you might want to post a screenshot of the following table into one of those ha-ha-larious “demotivational poster” memes marked “when you see it, you’ll shit bricks”. Just after a shot of Michael Grade and a great big cake.

Rank

Programme

Appearances on list

Av. Weekly Pos.

93

The Friday Night Project

17

21.06

136

Bo Selecta!

10

17.80

158

The Kevin Bishop Show

8

17.25

176

The Sunday Night Project

7

20.29

205

Peter Kay's Pheonix Nights

6

22.17

246

Dotcomedy

5

25.20

258

Star Stories

4

8.75

269

The I.T Crowd

4

11.00

299

A Bear's Tail

4

21.25

367

Film: The Net

3

13.67

384

Film: On The Buses

3

16.00

442

Le Show

3

28.00

456

Rude Tube

2

3.50

584

Peep Show

2

16.50

700

Spaced

2

25.50

1793

The Sopranos

1

28.00

Interesting for a number of reasons that might want you to think about buying a gun. Spaced clocking in at the 700th position on the list, even though all 14 episodes were first aired in the period under consideration here. Of those 14 episodes, just two made it into the Top Thirty for the weeks of transmission (for the record, w/e 26/9/99, 21st position 2.58m viewers, and w/e 11/3/01, 30th position and 2.37m viewers). Similarly, just two episodes of Peep Show make the weekly thirty (11/8/08, 28th, 1.46m, and 20/9/09, 5th, 2.16m – though that was from the most recent chart we’ve looked at, suggesting more of the current series will be there).

Beating it in the charts: A Bear’s Tail (“Oh no, my tail, which is actually a cock, has popped up for about the billionth week in a row”) appears four times, despite only having a single series, with Bo Selecta!, and its three jokes, appearing ten times. The cocking Friday/Sunday Night Project appear a total of 24 times, even though when they BBC had come up with the Saturday/Friday Night Armistice in the mid/late 90s, it was cancelled before you could say “whore in a helicopter”.

Other good/bad points: The I.T. Crowd being trumped by Star Stories, while Phoenix Nights (and no matter what you think of Peter Kay, the first series was brilliant) is bettered by The Kevin Bishop Show, both by appearances on the chart and average position. Meanwhile, in the world of classic US drama, The Sopranos made it into the Top 30 for a single solitary week, in 28th place.

For comparative purposes, you may also like to note that Peep Show and Spaced, both heralded (with more than a little justification) as modern classics of the sitcom format, have been bettered by well-meaning-but-ultimately-rubbish-Eurotrash-spin-off Le Show (no relation to the ace Harry Shearer show of the same name) and a repeat of the On The Buses film. Now, they aren’t sitcoms, admittedly, but hey, the single series of “grainy RealVideo clips blown up to full screen” internet clip show DotComedy made more appearances in the Channel Four weekly top thirty than both shows combined. The normal rules of logic clearly do not apply here.

Here’s a photo of Adam & Joe to make it all better.

Want to guess how many times The Adam & Joe Show appeared in the weekly Channel Four Top 30? Series three, four and five were in the in the timeframe applicable to it. So go on, guess. If you said “not even once, and yet a showing of Nuns On The Run made it onto there, for fuckity fuck’s sake”, award yourself a correctness point.